The American Naturalist Volume 30

Description

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1896 edition. Excerpt: ...like all previous travellers, leaves the question unanswered. Neither does he refer to Mr. McGuires' theory that the work was done with round hammerstones. But a block fortunately found at Chichen Itza, pecked on 1 This department is edited by H. C. Mercer, University of Pennsylvania. the surface with a pointed instrument and lined off for edge dressing with a flat edged tool, is shown as an interesting illustration (Fig. 1) of Fig. 1. Fragment of Stone from Chichen Itza, supposed to have been hewn byvthe ancient masons of Yucatan, the tools used are unknown, but we see the peckings of a pointed implement on the dressed side, and the long cuts of an edged tool along the upper margin. the effect on stone of the kind of tool we are hunting for. Until we find the implement, however, we may believe on early Spanish authority, that hard copper was used, or imagine adzes and chisels of stone as we please, while we recognize with Professor Holmes the importance of ransacking the sites of quarries, where the innumerable blocks (20,000 carved on the facade of the "Governors House," at Uxmal alone) were procured.'2 Happily chosen general observations give a clearness to the whole presentation, and the delightful yet confused and complex impression of the ruins left upon the mind by the accounts of travelers becomes simple in the colder light of Professor Holmes systematic observations. The reader continually thanks him as he would thank the compiler of an index to a work of many volumes. Such characteristic general features as the ignorance of a master principle of mason craft like joint binding, the feeble grasp of the.! Captain Theobert Maler informed me in Ticul in 1895, that he had seen several such quarries. Fig. 4. Miniature portal...show more